Hanging On
by BubblyPJ
Summary: This is a simple story about a woman who once loved her husband. Now, after many years, she's just hanging on to the thin thread of hope that might be her only hope of escape. AU dark!Naruto


_Hanging On_

by:_ BubblyPJ_

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This is a simple story about a woman who once loved her husband.

Someone who adored the presence that slept beside her, someone who once thought that he would love and care for her as long as she lived. Someone she thought she _safe _with.

The man that sat before her was not that man.

He sat with a blank expression adorning his carefully masked features, the once vibrant yellow spikes of his hair casting shadows on his face. "Very good." He complimented, leisurely sipping the handmade tea she had made- no, ordered to make for her dear, beloved husband.

He shot her a slight look of approval before placing the delicate piece of china, something that he thought resembled his fragile, obedient wife oh-so much, onto the table and viewed her with a thoughtful expression.

Hinata _knew _that almost non-existent flash on his face was.

Weak. Unneeded. Unnecessary. _Fragile._

She accepted the slight emotion with a fake, pasted smile. The small expression did not reach her eyes. Yet she smothered the disgust and refilled the tea cup with swift, elegant hands, delicate and pale, just as he had wished of her.

"Hinata."

She immediately straightened to attention obediently. Her gaze stared head on, just slightly planted past his smothering presence, because she was _scared_. Terrified even. But she would keep it to herself for now. For their unborn child's sake.

"Become scarce." He ordered with a dismissive wave of his hand as he leaned back into the great Hokage's chair, all the time in the world placed in the palm of his hand.

Hinata had also sensed the child coming. Though it wouldn't be exactly unusual for the Hokage's wife to be visiting her husband, like much had presumed, as she heavily pregnant, but the shinobi would.

Most that truly knew their Hokage would claim bullshit on sight. Not to his face, of course. This was because he was never in association with anyone unless it would be to his favour.

Hinata's hands were knotted in the soft folds beside her bulbous belly, twisting and trembling, hidden to her huband's eyes as she shivered inwardly in worry for the incoming young ANBU. _Weak._

Without a word, she slipped into the shadows of the room, her quivering hands hidden deep within the folds of her kimono.

"Hikaru." He murmured, and at once, a child, barely thirteen, darted in, the prestigious uniform of the ANBU encompassing his slender form.

Hinata's lips twisted at the small irony.

"Hokage-sama." The prepubescent boy said with a distinct lack of emotion in his words, empty and unforgiving. His masked head dipped in respect, a small, disobedient ac1tion that almost Hinata grin. Not yet.

"I have a mission for you." Naruto- no, _Hokage-sama_ said, gazing in slight amusement and interest at the emotionless young ANBU. _Another one, _that small, deceiving voice at the back of her mind whispered.

Hikaru was not an unknown guest to the many missions that the Hokage seemingly had piled up.

Hinata pursed her pretty, painted lips in disapproval, her cool, detached façade breaking. The suppression of her chakra immediately threatened the collapse so she washed the emotion off her face.

She would not like to be a guest of Hokage-sama's anger once again.

"Assasination." He slid a slender scroll across the polished wood of the desk, his dark, dark blue eyes faintly flickering in amusement as the boy remained impassive.

She could see the words form on his lips before he spoke. "A-Rank." Her white knuckles tightened on the silky fabric of her kimono, because if she didn't, she would _smash somethinq _right then and there.

"Yes, Hokage-sama." He murmured obediently and graciously accepted the scroll, but Hinata _could see._

She was not blind- oh, no, she was not. She was widely renowned across the shinobi lands for her prestigious, all-seeing pair of eyes. The legend was not untrue.

Hinata could see past the carefully built wall of trauma, pain and distrust. She could see the tiny, almost non-existent flicker of revulsion cross his dark eyes, the regret as he accepted the mission with a bow and the hoplessness as the Hokage gave a small smile/smirk (you could never really tell with him) of approval.

Hinata saw what was on the scroll. Assassination of a little girl who _could_ become a threat to the peace of their lands. Someone who had yet to become a killer; a young innocent who did not deserve her death because of her parentage. Someone Hinata would kill to protect, because a young, innocent girl _did not deserve death_.

As Hikaru darted out of the cold room, Hinata let out a small, harsh breath that deliberately went unknown to Naruto.

She placed her balmy hands onto the steel-like walls and shuddered out another ragged breath.

"What you do is wrong, you know." She whispered, tears slowly streaming down her pale cheeks, running down like fire because _she had held them in for so damn long._

Hinata knew this was her second offense of betrayal. Of both to her heart and her absolute loyalty to the Hokage.

She also knew if another offense like this occurred, she and her precious, unborn born, the only hope that her husband might be saved from the cruel, ruthless clutches of a shinobi life, would be exiled and would eventually vanish from the ninja world, never to be known or heard of again.

So, Hinata held on to that small string of hope. She shut down her feelings as the Hokage shot her a sharp look of warning, pursing her lips silently and bowed her head.

She survived and endured the maddening work of her 'husband' with a thin painted smile, because she would hang on for a while.

Just a little while and then she would break free.

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**A/N**: Hikaru means "radiance".


End file.
